Barefoot days and sundown songs

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BAREFOOT DAYS

AND

SUNDOWN SONGS

BY RAYMOND HUSE

Class JESl2lSI5
Book_?LJLlMiB~5

CQE^IGHT DEPOSIT.

Barefoot Days

BAREFOOT DAYS

AND

SUNDOWN SONGS

BY RAYMOND HUSE

Illustrated

with Photographs

by W. R. Spinney

Concord, N. H.
1922

Copyright, 1922, by Raymond Huse

OCT 1 3 i'J22

THE RTJMFORD PRESS
CONCORD

C1A686270

CONTENTS

Page

Sunset Is the Time for Song i

The Love He Has for Me 2

Barefoot Days 3

Take Me Back to Old New Hampshire 5

The Great Stone Face 9

His Little Brother on the Hillside 10

The Song of the Harper 12

When a Youth First Takes to Rhyming 15

"If My Uncle Sammy Calls Me'' 17

Just a Cottage by the Roadside 19

The Spirit of the Old Home in War Time 20

Sunset at Vincent Rock 23

"Old Hedding" 25

A Sunday School Rally Day Rhyme 26

The Drunkard's Dreary Home 29

Behind the Scenes 31

The Fighting Bishop 34

The Harpers I Hear at Sunset 35

"I Want My Father" 40

Confessions of a Wayside Wanderer 44

O God of Quiet Woodlands 47

The Folks Who Stay at Home 48

Gossip from Birdland 54

How God Can Make the Goldenrod 56

The Music of the Cowbells 58

Trees as Men . 62

Tasting Books 63

To Gene Stratton Porter 64

The Wartime Poets 65

My Creed 67

V

Page

Democracy 68

Revelation 69

* There Is No Hell" 70

Tomorrow 72

His Deity 73

A Toast 75

A Love Poem 76

"Where Is Your Home" 77
"We Will Walk the Golden Streets Together" 79

To My Critic 80

"The End Is Not Yet" 81

When We All Get Home at Night 83

vx

TO
M. H. H.

WHOSE LIFE IS A POEM

SUNSET IS THE TIME FOR SONG

WHEN the sun has passed the hilltops,
And the solemn shadows creep
Slowly down the purple mountain,
Then from out the mystic deep
Of the ocean of the twilight
Notes of music float along.
Daylight is the time for action,
Sunset is the time for song.

THE LOVE HE HAS FOR ME

n^OWARD the heavens, the grand old mountains

-■- Lift their summits, white with snow.
'Neath their shadows, grand, majestic.
Small seem all things here below.
Higher than the highest mountain,
Deeper than the deepest sea.
Purer than the purest fountain
Is the love He has for me.

Mighty billows of the ocean
Toss their spray upon the shore,
And the silent depths beneath them
Rest serene forevermore.
Higher than the highest mountain.
Deeper than the deepest sea.
Purer than the purest fountain
Is the love He has for me.

In the dark and shaded woodland,
Only found by those who look.
Softly sings the crystal fountain.
Mother of the laughing brook.
Higher than the highest mountain,
Deeper than the deepest sea.
Purer than the purest fountain
Is the love He has for me.

BAREFOOT DAYS

SOME sing of golden days of old,
Some dream of days to be ;
Of all the days the poets praise
The barefoot days for me !

When bashful May has slipped away
And June comes in with blaze,
The country boy now hails with joy
The dawn of barefoot days.

His well worn shoes his feet refuse,
Like some outgrown cocoon.
They seem to swell and burst their shell.
These early days of June.

To feel with mirth soft touch of earth
With feet unshod and free,
To just forget the brook is wet
And tumble in to see.

The only bother is your mother.
So careful of the sheet
That every night, to keep it white,
You have to wash your feet.

To her fond hope in cleansing soap
Tho' grumbling you must yield,
Tho' half the day you've been at play
In brooks out in the field.

Nor has she thought how clean each spot
Of soil on your bare feet,
No graft or grime or sinful slime,
Just nature's stains so sweet.

The green of grass where soft winds pass.
White dust of country roads.
The splash of rain, wild strawberry stain,
Cold kiss of hoppy toads.

Such stains of play you wash away
These summer nights so sweet.
He that is clean, the Master said,
Need only wash his feet.

In scenes of heaven, by artists given.
Upon the golden street.
The blessed folk all seem to walk
With happy free bare feet!

It may be then, I'll find again

In that fair land of praise

Where fields are green, and roads are clean.

My long lost barefoot days.

TAKE ME BACK TO OLD NEW
HAMPSHIRE

TAKE me back to old New Hampshire,
Where the hills are clad in green!
Take me back to old New Hampshire,
Where each peaceful boyhood scene
Seems to beckon and to call me

From the busy city mart,
To the homestead on the hillside
That is precious to my heart.

When a barefoot boy I wandered

In the pasture woods at night,
Listening for the cowbelPs jingle.

Watching as the fading light
Of the afterglow of sunset

Filtered through the wood's deep shade,
Where the timid hermit thrushes

Sang their flute song unafraid ;
Then my child- soul felt the nearness

Of the land where angels are.
And I thought the Christian's heaven

Just beyond the evening star.

Now I know I was mistaken,

It has come to me of late,
When I heard the thrush at twilight,

I was then inside the gate.
For the walls that shut out heaven

Are not made by fixed decree.
It is in our souls we build them

When we are no longer free ;
When our feet, no longer naked.

Cease to feel the cool, green moss,
And our souls, as tough as leather.

Miss the heart-throb of the cross.
And we join the mad procession,

With its glitter and its rush,
That prefers the hurdy-gurdy

To the vesper of the thrush!

Take me back to old New Hampshire,

Where the hills are clad in green!
Take me back to old New Hampshire,

Where each peaceful boyhood scene
Seems to beckon and to call me

From the busy city mart.
To the homestead on the hillside

That is precious to my heart.

When, with shining dinner bucket

And a book or two for show,
I started for the schoolhouse

Those Septembers long ago.
O'er the road by corn fields bordered,

'Neath the sky, cloud swept and clean.
While the distant pine-crowned mountains,

In the background clearly seen.
Seemed to lure one to the highlands

To prepare a laddie's thought
For the wonder of the world lore

By the patient teacher taught.

O the dreams that like the sunlight

On the schoolroom's knotty floor
Made us oft forget the text-books

While, wide-eyed, we looked before
To the wondrous purple future,

Till we heard the teacher say
We must turn to common fractions

Or perhaps we'd have to stay
After school in lone confinement.

She did not know, that faithful teacher,

In her horror of a dunce,
Life is full of common fractions.

But the dreamtizne comes but once.
Once, unless we carry with us.

Flashing in the sunlight's gleams.
From the schoolhouse by the roadside,

Life's full dinner-pail of dreams
Down the roadway to the future.

Take me back to old New Hampshire,

Where the hills are clad in green!
Take me back to old New Hampshire,

Where each peaceful boyhood scene
Seems to beckon and to call me

From the busy city mart.
To the homestead on the hillside

That is precious to my heart.

8

THE GREAT STONE FACE

SILENT sentinel of the hills,
With reverent awe my spirit thrills,
Beholding thee !

The words of wonder I would say
Are hushed to silence while I pray
To Him whose own creative thought
From massive rock thy profile wrought.

HIS LITTLE BROTHER ON THE
HILLSIDE

T>ESIDE a country roadway,
-^ By tourist's eye unseen,
With God's own sky above it.
Around it pastures green,
My thoughtful rural neighbor
Discovered near his * 'place,"
Upon some mossy ledges.
The profile of a face.

The heavy brow is thoughtful.
Just like the famous other.
He seems to us who know him
The *'old man's" little brother.
His face is not so solemn.
Rebuking human sin.
His lips in storm and sunshine
Are parted in a grin.
He doesn't guard the mountains,
With their vast stretch of miles.
But just a patch of pasture ;
So that is why he smiles.

10

"The Old Man's Little Brother"
Located on Branch Hill, Milton, N. H.

^

I cannot be a prophet
And speak to coming ages,
With face like old Elijah
So dark on history's pages.
I've just a patch of pasture,
With God's own sky above it;
That's why I am so happy;
I smile because I love it.

One face so marred in feature

The ages ne'er forget,

Across the solemn centuries

Is looking at us yet.

Christ saw from Calvary's mountain

Vast vales of human woe.

He brought to us redemption

Because He loved us so!

I cannot bear his burden.
His cup I cannot drink;
His vision from the mountain
Is not for me, I think.
In my small patch of pasture
I keep my simple tryst.
Rejoicing that He calls me
A brother of the Christ.

II

THE SONG OF THE HARPER

In the twilight's dusky gloaming,
In the evening's quiet calm,
Stood an aged harper, hoary,
Softly chanting David's psalm.
Sweet, the music, sweet and lowly,
Pure, distinctly came each word.
He was praying, he was singing.
He was praising David's Lord.

As we gathered close around him.
As we listened still and long
To each note of holy music.
To each burst of sacred song ;
Then he paused in his devotion.
Then did cease his hymn of praise,
And he sang so low and softly
This old lay of ancient days :

THE SONG

Easter lilies white were blooming.
Making glad each hearth and home ;
Easter bells were loudly ringing
From the holy church at Rome.

Far away within the forest,
Far from dwelling place of men.
Where the birds make sweetest music,
Where the lion builds his den,

12

stood a little woodland chapel,
With its belfry and its cross,
And its old and sacred altar.
Covered o'er with woodsy moss.

Ne'er had man stepped in its portals
Since the ancient days of yore.
When the silvery haired old hermit
Watched the people from his door.

And on each successive Sabbath
Rang the bell so loud and clear,
That the people came to worship
From the country far and near.

Now the chapel was deserted.
E'en at this glad Easter time,
And the little bell hung silent.
Though it longed to join the chime.

Soon a change came o'er the landscape,
Recently so bright and clear,
And the storm clouds roared and rumbled.
And the winds blew bleak and drear.

13

Easter lilies white were broken,
Making sad each hearth and home ;
Easter bells were harshly clanging,
No more peace in stately Rome.

Now the storm had reached the forest;
Beasts all shivered in the wood ;
Trees to ground were falling, crashing,
Firm the little chapel stood.

Mid the tempest's roar and rumble
Could be heard a sound so clear
That it echoed through the forest,
O'er the country far and near.

For the storm winds loudly blowing
Swayed the bell now to and fro.
And the tempest broke its bondage.
And it rang as long ago.

It was heard above the storm winds,
Calming creature's fear and dread.
Ever ringing, ever singing,
**Christ has risen from the dead."

14

WHEN A YOUTH FIRST TAKES TO
RHYMING

WHEN a youth first takes to rhyming
He will sing of broken hearts,
And the ashes of dead roses,
And the pathos of lost arts.
He will write of mournful moonlight ;
He will revel in dark fears.
As the sophomoric preacher
Likes the compliment of tears.

But when life has beat against him

With its tempest and its storm,

When he has to gather driftwood

His own hearthstone to keep warm,

When his own roses, not another's,

Have been smitten by life's frost.

When the way to be successful

Is the art that he has lost ;

Then the law of compensation.

Given for all evils here,

Makes him search through earth and heaven

For the message of good cheer.

15

Sorrow ceases to be lovely
When real trouble on him crowds,
And he learns the art of weaving
Silver lining for his clouds.
So the young poets sit aweeping,
Just apart from scenes of mirth,
And the old ones brim with laughter.
Helping God cheer up his earth.

i6

"IF MY UNCLE SAMMY CALLS ME''*
The Song of the Drafted Man, 19 17

I LIVE in good old Boston,
I have business, home and friends,
But when the flag of freedom
To me its summons sends,
I'll not invent a reason
Why I should answer, **No."
If my Uncle Sammy calls me
I will go.

I've a mother and a sweetheart
Who watched the draft with fears,
But when I was selected
They smiled behind their tears.
They said, *'01d Glory calls you.
You will not answer *No,'
If your Uncle Sammy wants you
You must go."

* The first man to receive notice in Boston that he was selected
by the draft, a musician, said : "If my Uncle Sammy calls me I will

go."

17

So I laid aside my banjo
And the peaceful ways of home,
With pride I donned the khaki
The great wide world to roam.
And if I fall in battle,
I want the world to know,
If my Uncle Sammy calls me
I will go.

Oh, the iron cross is rusty
And the iron crown is old.
The kings and tyrants tremble
And the kaiser's feet are cold;
The stars and stripes are coming,
And defeat they never know,
And my Uncle Sammy calls me
And I go.

i8

JUST A COTTAGE BY THE ROADSIDE

(1918)

JUST a cottage by the roadside
Battered by the storms of time,
Just a window in that cottage
Where the morning-glories climb
Over panes that loosely rattle,
Frames that warp and bend and sag.
But behind the dew-kissed blossoms
Can be seen a service flag.

And that little wayside cottage.
Glorified by that lone star,
Like a lighthouse by the ocean
Sends its beams of light afar ;
In the storm the good ship. Freedom,
Where the v/ild waves fiercely chafe
On the ragged rocks of danger.
Sees that light — and she is safe !

19

THE SPIRIT OF THE OLD HOME IN
WAR TIME

(1918)

HE drives the cows himself tonight
O'er pastures brown and green,
'Neath sunset skies aglow with light
While night hawks fly between.
The boy who used to drive them down
And sometimes make them prance,
Now in a suit of olive brown
Is driving foes from France.

His father who, to tell the truth.

Is older than he vows.

Is camouflaging long lost youth

And driving home the cows.

It seems to him but yesterday

A little barefoot boy.

With garments tattered from his play

And face aglow with joy.

Was walking, talking by his side

So many tales to tell

He had to hush him, while he tried

To hear the distant bell.

20

He sees again his sudden fright
At whirr of partridge wings,
Recalls again his grave delight
With every bird that sings ;
Remembers how when from the track
He strayed upon a thistle
He winked his childish tear-drops back
And started up a whistle.

And when at last he reached the gate,

His pride and joy complete,

To see his mother smiling wait

Her grown-up son to greet.

He boasted how he now could keep

From her all lurking harms.

But when that night he went to sleep

He slept within her arms.

Ah, those were days so safe and glad

We scarce can think them true.

Before the world had grown so sad,

When summer skies were blue!

21

He drives the cows himself tonight

But thanks his gracious God

That should he fall in perilous fight

And sleep ^neath foreign sod,

The boy God gave him, clean and true

As heroes famed in story.

Had helped to carry the red, white and blue

To victory and to glory!

And though tonight he falls asleep
On fields with carnage red.
Where angel armies vigil keep
Above the hero dead,
I'm sure that he is just as safe
As when by Mother's knee
For God who made us love him so
Must love him more than we !

22

SUNSET AT VINCENT ROCK

SUNSET at Vincent Rock,
And God's voice speaks to me
From trees that stand the tempest's shock,
From winds that blow untamed and free.
From silent shade where dripping ferns

Now bend their graceful form in prayer.
My heart once more its lesson learns
And feels God's presence everywhere.

Twilight beneath the pines,

Hushed is the tumult of the day.
The evening star in splendor shines

To guide the traveler on his way —
The way that leads up through the night

To where the gates of life unfold
And earth-blind eyes receive their sight,

Beyond the sunset sea of gold.

Before us lies the year.

With many a load of care
And many a cross to make us fear.

We lift our hearts in prayer ;
O thou, whose peace we feel this hour>

We would not stray from Thee ;
Go with us, let Thy keeping power

Our constant bulwark be —
Our bulwark and our song beside.

For we would take from here
A peace and gladness that abides

Throughout the storm-swept year.
23

And when the twilight of our life

Shall still our pilgrim feet
And all its stress and all its strife

And all the daytime and its heat
Shall cool to silence and to night,

As cools this summer day,
O Rock, more sure than this one here,

Be with us then, we pray.
Light up the home-path with thy stars,

Lest we should lose our way.
Let down the sunset's crimson bars,

And take us in to stay.

(Vincent Rock is a huge boulder on the wooded hillside at
Hedding, New Hampshire, at which sunset vesper services are
held each summer.)

24

"OLD HEDDING''

GONE are the days when the fathers worshipped
here,
Gone are the saints to memory so dear,
But we are the sons and daughters of the sires
Come, Lord, and make our alters glow with old-time
fires.

Chorus —
Old Hedding, Old Hedding,

Salvation* s camping ground;
Oh, let thy pines ring out once more.

Thy joyful sound.

Still human hearts are hungering for peace.
For world-weary souls the struggle ne'er will cease,

Till at the Master's feet we lay our burdens down.
With old-time victories of faith our conflicts crown.
Chorus —

Soon, for us all, will end the battle shout.
One by one, we are being mustered out.
At home with the Lord, we will dwell forever more,
And meets the saints of Hedding, now gone on
before.

Chorus —

(This is sung to the tune of *'01d Black Joe" at Hedding
Camp Meeting, Hedding, N. H., each summer.)

25

A SUNDAY SCHOOL RALLY DAY RHYME

A YEAR ago, about this time,
I answered to my name in rhyme,
And so this season once again,

I seized my rusty poet's pen.
When suddenly to me did seem

To come a vision or a dream.
An angel came through gloomy night.

And filled my little room with light.
While in his hand he held a rule.

*Tve come to measure," he said, **your school;
For up in Heaven it must be known

How much your school this year has grown."

**A11 right," I said, **the church unlock

And look at Brother Sanborn's clock.*
'Tis written on its face with chalk

And one has said that figures talk.
Or better still just take a look

At our secretary's book.
'Tis figured there without distraction,

Down to the smallest common fraction."

* A clock that recorded the attendance.

26

The angel slowly shook his head,

And in a gentle tone he said,
**Up in Heaven it must be known

How much each scholar here has grown."
**0 yes," I said, **I think each scholar

Is growing bigger and growing taller.
There's Doris Hayes and Florence Knight,

Growing to little women quite.
And Myron Pickering, fast's he can.

Is growing up to be a man.
I think you'll find that each child here

Has grown an inch or two this year.

But once again he shook his head.

And in a gentle voice he said.
His radiant face toward mine now turned,

**I mean how much has each one learned?"
**0h, as to that, I can't quite tell.

But some of us now know full well,
Rehoboam, Jeroboam, Elijah,

Ahab, Jezebel, Abijah,
Elisha, Naaman, Ahaziah,

Jehoida, Joash, Athaliah,
And other lights of lesser fame

We know by sign if not by name."

27

But once again he shook his head,

And in a gentle voice he said,
Now holding up his golden rule,

**Is it for that you came to school,
To learn of prophets, queens and kings.

To learn of folks and dates and things?
Up in heaven it must be known

How much each scholar here has grown.
In patience, love and Christian grace."

**Ah, well," I said, *'if that's the case.
You'll have to fold your wings and roam

And spend a day in each one's home.
This fact I'm sure you can learn there.

As you cannot in house of prayer."

**Amen!" he said, *'and so adieu.'*

And saying that away he flew.
And then so swiftly went away,

And back to realms of endless day.
Be sure you're kind and good and true.

When he comes to spend the day with you.

(Written for the roll call at Sanbomville, N. H., 1904.)

28

THE DRUNKARD'S DREARY HOME

(Tune— My Old Kentucky Home. Written for the W.C.T.U.)

THE sun shines dim on the drunkard's dreary home ;
'Tis winter, the father's away.
No fire in the hearth, no cheer in the room,
Just a sob from the cradle all the day.
The children cry both from hunger and from dread,
The mother no comfort can give.
Her heart is glad for the little one now dead
While she mourns for others who still live.

Chorus —
Weep on, then, my sisters.
Oh weep and work and pray
Till you wash the stain
From the flag with your tears
And the drunkard's dreary home pass away.

Once they were rich in affection and in joy,
She waited his footsteps at night ;
He came from work as happy as a boy
To the fireside's welcome, warm and bright.
The babe she held for his eager fond embrace ;
But now when his footsteps she hears.
She hastens to hide the children from his face.
And her smile is sadder than her tears.
Chorus —

29

Her sobs are heard by the women o^er the land,

They're planning and praying today ;

And now strong men as helpers with them stand

And the grog shop's power must pass away.

A few more years and the city will be dry,

The State and the Nation besides ;

The children then will cease their bitter cry

And the mother's weary tears be dried.

Chorus —

Sing on, then my sisters.

Oh sing and hope and pray,
Till the flag we love is as pure as God above.
And the drunkard's dreary home pass away.

(This was written before the enactment of the eighteenth,
amendment, but is inserted here ''lest we forget.")

30

BEHIND THE SCENES

(Lines suggested by the death of Mrs. S. F. Upham.)

BRAVE old Moses in the limelight,
Battling for the truth and right,
Had a mother in the shadows,
Patient, faithful, out of sight.
Pouring out her life to teach him
How to be so strong and brave.
Breathing in the soul that made him
Lift the downtrod and the slave.

Wendell Phillips, thank God for him
And his brave, victorious strife!
But the power that held and kept him
Was his patient, shut-in wife.
She whose happy eyes were proudest
When he stood alone for truth,
*Tell him not to shilly-shally,"
Said this lover of his youth.

31

White-plumed leader of the nation
Hastens from his life of care
To the bedside in Ohio,
**Tell my mother I'll be there."
Thus McKinley let his heart speak,
And the listening nation knew
That his mother's faith and ideals
Helped to keep him clean and true.

Gilbert Haven went to glory
In a blaze of heavenly light,
But the star that led him onward
Through the darkness of the night
Was the memory of Mary,
Many years beneath the sod,
Was the loyal love for Mary,
Many years up there with God.

32

Samuel Upham, brave old hero
Of New England's fighting stock,
With convictions, firm established,
Like his native Plymouth rock.
Sending out the sons of thunder.
With their hearts and brains aflame
With the message of the gospel,
And the power of Jesus' name ;
But amid his greatest triumphs
With affection he would glance
For the lock of glad approval
Of the mistress of the manse.
She, the mother of the prophets.
She, his household's quiet queen,
In the shadows, patient, faithful.
There with God, the great Unseen.

When the Lord makes up his jewels
In the morning soon to be,
Not the brightest and the rarest
Will be there whose names we see
Blazened out in flaming letters
Upon history's scroll of fame,
But the quiet souls behind them.
When the Lord and Angels name.

33

THE FIGHTING BISHOP*

IN the thickest of the conflict,
With the bullets singing past,
There he stood, our fighting Bishop,
Sounding out his bugle blast.

If sometimes some hearts were weary

Of his summons loud and shrill,
All around the camp is lonely.

Now his ringing notes are still.

But for him the rest is blessed.

For he loved the ways of peace.
And his face was toward the sunrise

Of the land where battles cease.

And although we oft have heard him

Sound the bugle, loud and sharp,
Yet we think the word was welcome :

"Change thy trumpet for a harp."

* In memory of Bishop W. F. Mallalieu of the Methodist Episco-
pal Chtirch.

34

THE HARPERS I HEAR AT SUNSET

FAITHFUL John on Patmos Island,
On the Sabbath day of old,
Heard the bands of heavenly harpers
Playing on their harps of gold.

And sometimes, I've thought at sunset.
When the western sky was calm,
I could hear them softly playing
On some resurrection psalm.

When a boy I'm sure I heard them.
As the evening shadows crept
Down the purple mountain forests.
And I laid me down and slept.

And as years go by so swiftly.
And life's shadows gather round,
And life's sunset glows before me,
Oft again I hear them sound.

And my ear, unskilled in music.
Knows not of their notes and sharps.
But my heart, so hot and restless.
Feels the message of their harps.

I can see them, in my vision.
Standing by the crystal sea
Playing, as in mighty anthems.
Everlasting harmony.

35

Not all gladness is their music,
Like some songs we sing on earth,
When we try to drown our heartache,
In our merriment and mirth.

There's a minor note of sadness
In the anthem that they play.
Like the sorrow of a mother
When her child is far away.

But far sweeter is the music
With that note of sorrow there.
And more healing to my spirit.
With its fevered pain and care.

And the notes of joy and gladness
Swell out loud and sweet and clear.
Like the birds returned in springtime
With their songs of life and cheer.

And I say, when life is restless
With its problems and its care,
*'Well, no matter how the earth is.
It's all bright and clear up there."

36

** Where the harpers of the sunset
Play their never ceasing song,
Of the final, mighty triumph
Over darkness, sin and wrong."

Storms sweep over the horizon.
Earthquakes, pestilence and flame
Come to earth, and men go downward
In defeat and sin and shame ;

But the music never ceases
Up there by the isles of balm,
And the harpers, never weary.
Play their resurrection psalm.

Storm tossed, fretful, tired and weary.
Sometimes now I face the west;
Then I hear the harpers harping,
Calm in everlasting rest.

And my spirit soon is quiet,
'Neath the burden and the rod;
For I know the harpers ever
Do behold the face of God.

37

And because of that, their music
Never ceases, day and night;
For up there by walls of jasper.
They can see His throne is white!

While I only tread the valley
Rained upon by many tears,
Darkened by the clouds of sorrow.
Disappointment, loss and fears.

And I cannot see the vision
Of the Father's cloudless face.
On the mountain they are singing;
I am stumbling at its base.

But some day, 1*11 see a harper
Of that band now gone before us.
Bringing me an invitation
To come up and join the chorus!

So with all my heart I listen
While the shadows gather 'round.
And the sunset gilds the hill tops
For the harper's peaceful sound.

38

That not strange may seem the music
When the pearly gates unfold,
And I take my place among them,
Up there by the streets of gold!

Sing on, then, ye heavenly harpers.
Standing in the heavenly place,
Glad and calm because you ever
Look upon the Father* s face.

And the throne of God before you
Shines above the isles of balm.
Sing on harpers of the sunset,
Sing your resurrection psalm!

And my heart, so sad and weary
From the age-long power of wrong.
At the sunset time shall listen.
Strive to learn your triumph song ;

While the western sky is crimson,
And the western hills are gold,
And the harpers still are playing
As they played in days of old!

39

"I WANT MY FATHER"

WHEN school had closed in early summer,
Vacation time arrived with glee ;
My Grandma wrote her usual letter,
*'Now send the boy to stay with me."
My Grandma lived in the country,
Her cottage home was quaint and gray,
A great oak tree stood guard beside it,
'Twas just the place for boys to play!

I left behind the dusty city

For God^s own country, clean and sweet.

And kicking off my shoes and stockings,

I wandered out with free, bare feet

Through fields and woods of soft pine needles ;

While ox-eyed daisies, khaki clad.

Would gravely nod their cordial greeting.

And smile upon the barefoot lad.

I lived in comradeship fraternal

With squirrels, birds and clouds and sky.

Thoreau, the sweet-souled Concord pagan,

Was not so much at home as I.

40

But when at last the week had ended,
To fill my childish cup with joy,
My father came to spend the Sabbath
Out with his mother and his boy.
For thirty years my sad-faced father
Has been beyond the gates empearled.
But if by God's own grace assisting
I come at last to that fair world.
If he will give me there one Sabbath
Like those at Grandma's used to be,
I'm sure, whatever else is lacking.
That will be paradise for me.

We lay upon the grass together,

I showed him all my home-made toys,

While Grandma hustled in the kitchen

To get a dinner for her boys.

And noon with hazy Sabbath stillness

Was mantling field and dale and hill

With sacred hush like that in heaven,

When for half an hour 'twas still!

But all glad days must have their twilight,
And when the evening shadows fell.
My father went back to the city ;
And as he kissed me his farewell
And climbed into a neighbor's wagon
My world turned into ashes gray ;
My boyish heart became so lonely.
The "soul of summer slipped away.'*

41

I hear again the horse and wagon
Receding through the evening gloom,
I see again the lonely outlines
Of my Grandma's lonely room.
While without the mournful crickets
Their evening vespers sadly kept,
I fear it tells not half the story
To say the homesick laddie wept.
For one may weep in sobful silence
That passes like the breath of noon.
I howled out like a dog at midnight
Baying at the mournful moon.

My Grandma (bless her pious memory I)

Would try some words of cheer to give,

And mix them with an exhortation

Upon the proper way to live.

She told me I was acting foolish ;

(And I have learned since that sad day

That some folks think it quite religious

To comfort mourning ones that way!)

**Why, here's your cart and here your pla3rthings,

And in the pasture 'cross the way.

There are quarts of huckleberries.

And you may pick them every day."

42

But, oh, the spot that ached within me

Could not with things be satisfied,

I wanted only my own father.

For him alone my child-heart cried.

And when a laddie wants his father

As deep as any want can be.

For all the berries in creation

And all the playthings — what cares he?

St. Augustine, the old theologian.

Said in some lines that come to me :

**0 God, *tis for thyself Thou madest us.

And until we find in Thee,

The Rest, we are forever restless."

Our Father God, hear us we pray,

And when the shadows fall at even,

Still with us in lifers cottage stay.

For all the charms of earth do mock us.

Our pla3rthings fail to satisfy ;

**I want my Father, my own Father."

Our homesick hearts forever cry

43

CONFESSIONS OF A WAYSIDE
WANDERER

I ADMIRE the prosperous farmer
And his well-tilled fruitful field,
And the way he makes Old Nature
Bounteous harvests for him yield.

And in youth they tried to show me
How to wield the rake and hoe,
And to teach me agriculture
Such as every man should know.

But IVe long ago forgotten
All the useful things they said,
For the blood that flows within me
Is the Indian kind instead.

Much as I admire the cornfield
And the garden truck and such,
I confess September blossoms
Please my vision just as much.

Not the kind that grow in gardens.
Standing stiffly in a row.
But the wild things in the pasture.
Growing where they want to grow.

Watered by the dews each morning,
Smiled upon by Father Sol,
Close to Him whose gracious spirit
Is the all within the all.

44

The Wayside Wanderer

Goldenrod, the sweet wild aster,
And closed gentian by the brook,
Spattered like colored illustrations
On kind Nature^s open book.

These fine lawns within the city,
Barbered by a sharp machine.
Stiff and stately like a carpet,
I like them because they^re green.

I confess that I like better
Tangled patches by the wall,
Where no blundering human gardener
Interferes with God at all.

Where the blackberry vines run riot,
Or some useless winsome weed.
Like a humble rural rhymster.
Blossoms, fades and goes to seed.

Stately parks by benefactors
All endowed and primly fixed,
Where some careful landscape-gardener
All the season's wealth has mixed,

45

And arranged in plans artistic,

Have their place in life, I know,

For where else could starched nurse maidens,

And policemen have to go?

But as for me, the woods primeval.
With their reverent twilight hush.
Where no fussy man with hatchet
Has cleaned out the underbrush.

And dry twigs crack beneath you
As you make your way along,
And the partridge drums defiant.
And you hear the wild thrush song!

So the farmers think I'm lazy
As in fruitful fields they work.
And the town-folk think I'm crazy.
While in shaded spots I lurk.

As they shake their heads efficient.
Pitying my strange taste, meanwhile.
Something in my soul keeps singing,
I look up to God and smile.

46

O GOD OF QUIET WOODLANDS

/^ GOD of quiet woodlands,
^^ Apart from life's mad rush,
Beneath whose shade forever
Devotion's twilight hush
Subdues the fevered spirit
To restful trust and prayer!
O God of quiet woodlands,
Art Thou, too, everywhere?

Upon a peaceful hillside.
Around me solitude,
'Tis easy, like old Moses,
To say, *The Lord is good";
But down there in the valley
Whose streets are hot with care,

0 God of dark cool forests.
Wilt Thou go with me there?

1 much prefer to linger
Where mountain breezes sweep
O'er stretches vast and silent,
Where pine trees vigil keep.
But on the path that lures me
Back to the noise and soil,
Christ's footprints I discover,
So I go back to toil!

(Written for the close of vacation.)

47

THE FOLKS WHO STAY AT HOME

(For Old Home Day, Concord, 192 1. Dedicated to H. H. M.)

WHEN a man goes from New Hampshire
To some Main Street in the West,
And out there wins fame and fortune,
Takes his place among the best ;
Then his neighbors and acquaintance,
Like to talk about his fame ;

Orators on each Old Home Day
Speak with glowing praise, his name.
While I would not pluck a blossom
From the wreath of those who roam,
Yet I choose to sing the glory
Of the folks who stay at home.

There are farmers in New Hampshire
Plowing on these rugged fields,
Who, if they were on the prairies.
Where Old Nature harvests yields
Out of all direct proportion
To the labor or the brains
Of the folks who wield the sickle.
And who count their greedy gains,
Would be rich as fabled Croesus,
But who now can scarcely hoard
Cash enough to pay the upkeep.
Of a modest little Ford.

48

From their homes upon the hillside
They look down in calm content,
Walk the paths in field and pasture
Where their goodly fathers went ;
Clean of mind, and strong of spirit,
They don't care about life's frills,
Just so they can see the sunset.
Over old New Hampshire's hills.

There are lawyers in New Hampshire,
Just old-fashioned country Squires,
Daily tramping on the notion
That all legal lights are liars.
Drawing wills and signing papers,
Seeing what old Blackstone said.
Who, if they had emigrated.
Would be Congressmen instead ;
But they live in their frame dwellings.
Fronting on the village green,
Full content, if from their windows
On a clear day can be seen
Washington, or some old mountain.
Piled against the cloud-swept sky.
Full content in old New Hampshire
Quietly to live and die.

49

There are preachers in New Hampshire,

Riding over rugged hills,

Bronzed in summer by the sunshine,

Sharpened by the winter chills.

Telling out the old evangel

To a little scattered few.

Wearing clothes as old as Adam,

Preaching sermons fresh and new.

Who if they had followed early

Horace Greeley's call *'Go West,"

Might be filling city pulpits.

Bishoprics and all the rest.

Now, their only compensation

Is to tread their native sod.

Living on their meditations.

With their golden dreams — and God.

50

There are women in New Hampshire,
Like wild roses in the dew,
Giving all their wondrous sweetness
To a faithful little few,
Who, if they had been transplanted
When the buds began to burst.
In the world^s great flower contest.
Would have taken prize the first.
Now, instead, they wash the dishes.
Run the Ladies' Aid and Church,
Wield in many a rural schoolhouse
Modern substitutes for birch.
But they see each year the crimson
Steal adown the mountain side.
And they keep their sense of wonder.
And their souls are satisfied.

**Why then," asks the modern booster,

With his table and his chart,

**Did these people not get busy

And go out and take their part

In this world's broad field of battle

In the bivouac of life.

Be not like dumb, driven cattle.

Be a hero in the strife?

Why were they content to simply

Live their dwarfed and stunted lives.

And to never know the glory

Of the pilgrim who arrives?"

51

Just because like some old elm tree,
Lifting leafy hands to God,
Undisturbed by stoim or axeman,
They are rooted in the sod.
There is something in our mountains.
There is something in our streams.
More potent than the wanderlust,
More lovely than our dreams.
And if they should start to journey
Westward o'er the beaten track,
That Old Man among the mountains
Silently would woo them back ;
He, the guardian of New Hampshire,
Sober, wistful, full content.
Made by God on that fresh morning
When He made the firmament.
As a kind of plan and pattern
Of the men He had in mind,
Men who would not need to wander
True success and peace to find.

52

And perhaps on Life's great payday,
With the books of God unsealed,
We shall see that reapers' wages
Are not reckoned by the field.
And that they who gleaned the corners
Share the Master's glad **Well done,"
Equally with those whose labors
Won a place within the sun.

Anyhow on this Old Home Day,

Songs of praise I choose to give

To New Hampshire's sons and daughters.

Who to-day serenely live.

Where the Merrimack's gentle waters

Carry tidings to the tide.

With the peaceful vales beside them

And the mountains that abide.

While I would not pluck a blossom

From the wreath of those who roam.

Yet I chose to sing the glory

Of the folks who stay at home.

53

GOSSIP FROM BIRDLAND

(To H. F. L.)

THE blue jay is a handsome bird,
He sports a suit of blue,
He bosses all the other birds
The whole wide woodland through ;
He struts about and flaps his wings
As though he were a king,
But shows plebeian ancestry
When he begins to sing.
His harsh shrill notes as they sound out
Just give his case away.
And all who hear him soon perceive
He's nothing but a jay!

His friend, the owl, who lives near by.

Is just as crude as he.

But sits in solemn silence there

Upon the old oak tree.

He looks so wise as he peers out

From eyes in daylight dim.

That all the birds as they pass by

Take off their hats to him.

And every mother bird around

Instructs her little fowl

To learn his lessons and grow wise

Like good old Father Owl.

54

The modest thrush is seldom seen

Upon the public square,

But in the shadows of his home

He makes his music rare.

The Thrushes all are cultured folk,

But never make a show,

Their dress though neat, is modest brown,

And you would never know

That they could buy out Mr. Jay;

And quiet laughs of glee

They can*t restrain when e*er they think,

Of Father Owl's oak tree.

So things with birds are much the same

As 'neath the gilded dome.

The Jays and Owls run politics,

The Thrushes stay at home

And criticize in silver tones

Around their quiet dinners.

In sight of Him who owns the woods,

Who are the biggest sinners?

55

HOW GOD CAN MAKE THE
GOLDENROD

TTOW God can make the goldenrod
A 1 Grow up from such a soil,

When all our human gardeners

Must plan and sweat and toil

To make their gardens blossom

And make their flowers grow,

Is one of Nature's secrets

That I should like to know.

A bald and sandy barren field
That hardly will grow weeds.
Like that ground in the parable
Where fell the wayside seeds!
A tiny desert, just a patch
Of stunted burnt up sod!
God smiles on it with summertime
And lo, the goldenrod!

56

A flower so fine and delicate,

That anyone would think

It came from richest garden soil,

And had been wont to drink

From spraying fountains all its days.

Instead of passing showers.

From its wild childhood it becomes

Tlje prince of all the flowers.

We study hard to understand

The wondrous laws of God,

And then he bafiies all our pride

With fields of goldenrod.

And Lincoln splitting rails, with fame

Makes all the ages ring

And He who came from Nazareth

Makes all the angels sing.

57

THE MUSIC OF THE COWBELLS

I*M not much at going to concerts
Where you pay high for your seat,
And pretend you are familiar
With the musical elite ;
Where the high-toned singers warble,
Trying hard to beat the birds,
While they keep you dumbly guessing
At the meaning of their words.

But one special kind of music

Needs no words its song to tell,

'Tis the tintinnabulation

Of the sweet toned old cowbell.

You may smile, then you haven't heard it

Under circumstances right.

Course there's no great music in it
When it jangles through the night
In some so-called celebration
Or a midnight serenade
Of a newly married couple.
And it wasn't ever made
For a substitute for sleighbells!
That is going against all art.
Like an elephant that is harnessed
To a fairy pony cart.

58

But you take a summer Sabbath

When you try God's day to keep

In the good old rural fashion,

And go out to salt your sheep,

All around you is the stillness

Of the summer afternoon.

Then from out some woodsy valley

There come floating pretty soon,

Softened by the stretch of distance,

Notes that somehow seem to suit

Day and place, mood and occasion.

Musical as any flute.

Mixed with locusts' calls and crickets

And the crows' attempt at song.

If you don't think that real music

With your ear there's something wrong.

59

Once, when in a distant city,

I was walking, tired and sad,

Down the street there drove the ragman.

And he had what they all had.

As a badge of his profession,

Cowbells strung across the rear

Of his rattlety old wagon ;

Just as soon as he came near,

My mind took a swift, far journey.

Over miles of hill and plain.

Over years of busy lifetime.

To the good old pasture land

Where, when summer suns were setting

In the twilight's fading light.

As a barefoot country school-boy,

I drove home the cows at night.

And ere stars had all been lighted

In the summer skies so deep,

In my plain unvarnished chamber

I had fallen to care-free sleep.

60

So I tell you, that's great music
That can make a man forget
Where he is and what he's doing;
I haven't found a concert yet
That can do that quite so well
As the tintinnabulation
Of the sweet toned old cowbell.

All this makes me sometimes wonder
If what we call heavenly grace
Won't be simply rearranging,
Putting each thing in its place,
And the humble and the ugly,
All except the wilful wrong.
Will look different when the Artist
Or the Maker of the song
Gets them in the right surroundings
Where they have a chance to shine.
Piles around the human cowbells
Pasture hills and woods of pine.

6i

TREES AS MEN

UPON a ragged pasture ledge
I watched the wild, September rain;
It fell upon the shivering woods,

It splashed upon the lonesome lane.
The friendly hills were shrowded all,

A veil of mist upon each head ;
I heard it whispered everywhere
That gentle Summertime was dead.

The stern gray pine before it stiffened.

The gentle maple wept and swayed,
The elm tree bowed in stately sorrow.

As one of tempests unafraid.
As one accustomed to the stress

And ravage of the winter storm.
But reached her graceful branches out

To keep her frailer neighbors warm.

The sturdy oak refused to tremble.

But braced himself against the shock,
And stretched his rugged roots far out

And laid firm hold upon a rock.
And as I came in from the storm

I saw reversed once again
The ancient wonder, and beheld

The forest trees as walking men.

62

TASTING BOOKS

"Some books are to be tasted." — Bacon.

LONGFELLOW tastes like raspberry sherbet,
Whose flavor is like a dream;
And Whittier tastes like Indian pudding,
With apples and golden cream;
And Emerson* s flavor is like the olive,
A taste that is acquired ;
And Hawthorne has the wild grape tang,
A thing to be desired ;
And Lowell is wine for thirsty souls,
The harmless kind that cheers.
Thoreau has mixtures in his mug
Of bitter-sweet root beers ;
And Bryant is frozen pudding,
That chills and makes you shiver.
While Bayard Taylor brings you trout
From many a crystal river.
Gene Stratton Porter, bless her heart.
Tastes like the berries of June,
And while you taste them, all the birds
Start up a merry tune.
And Winston Churchill is a salad
Made by some modern rule ;
And Harold Wright is hunter's game
Shot by a shaded pool ;
While Joseph Lincoln, dripping salt,
A dish no landsman knew.
Reminds me of a quahaug soup
Or steaming lobster stew.

63

TO GENE STRATTON PORTER

DEAR **Laddie's" little sister,
And friend of every child,
And blessed advertizer
Of **Music of the wild,"
To you, a rural rhymster
Would like to send a word
Of glad appreciation.
I*m sure some passing bird
Would take it, if he knew me
As well as he knows you.
And drop it at the * *Limberlost,"
Where folks are all *'true blue."

As **bearer of the morning,"
And chaser of the dark.
It would be very fitting
For me to call you "lark";
But somehow when I listen
To your mixed merry tune.
You 'mind me of a catbird
Who sings to God in June !
In your glad notes of music
And your rich song of cheer
The echoes of the woodland
And singing swamp I hear.
You make me leave my study
And tramp out from the town^
And all my priggish idols
You flop right upside down.

64

THE WARTIME POETS

FOR barren years no prophet's hand
Has struck the living lyre,
The poets have been prosy folks
With no celestial fire,
Save where a Riley heard the notes
That rise from common sod
And through October woodlands walked
With Nature and with God ;
Or where a Kipling climbed alone
A mountain crowned with flame,
And drunk with glory, uttered words
That won him deathless fame.

Then came the fearful holocaust,

Apparently from hell.

And sleepy watchmen no more cried

Through sleepy streets, **AlPs well!"

But martyr blood flowed crimson red

And crosses marked each hill.

Then o'er the plains where soldiers fought

There sounded notes long still.

6s

The wartime poets wrote lines of fire

With ecstasy divine ;

With them I would not dare to place

These ragged rhymes of mine,

But humbly place my tribute here

To that new race of men

Whose words will live for evermore,

And bravely died with sword in hand

And sung with dying breath

Immortal songs that take from life

Its prose and sweeten death.

They do not know, in coming years,

Our lips will kiss the sacred sod

Where they fell singing; their fame secure,

They play their golden harps to God.

60

MY CREED

THE Fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man,
The Saviorhood of Jesus Christ,
My life a love-made plan.
Such as fond mothers love to dream
When baby's eyes they see!
The realization of that plan
Is largely up to me!

The universe has known its night,
Its clouds will pass away,
I hear the bird-song and I see
Red gleams of coming day.

67

DEMOCRACY

"One is your master, even Christ and all ye are brethren."

Matt. 23:10.

DEMOCRACY is no new thing,
Although its name is new;
Christ taught its truth by Olivet
When human rights were few.
And if the world had spent more time
In doing as He said,

We'd have less of bishop and less of king.
And more of man instead.

68

REVELATION

GOD in the pine trees and white clad, gracefu
birch,
God in the birdsong, bobolink and thrush,
God in the Scriptures, like life sap in the tree.

And beneath the fever and the fretful rush
God, eternal Spirit, liveth, too, in me !

God in the sunshine, healing storm-rent scars,
God in the moonlight, stirring wistful dreams,

God in the violets, springing from the sod,

God, the guiding course for history^s turbulent
streams,

God in Christ, our Savior, eternal Son of God!

69

"THERE IS NO HELL"

THERE is no hell!
That God would doom to lasting flames

A portion of mankind,
Is but the nightmare of the race,

The frightened dream of mortal mind.
Man! Of God's own self, a part;

And dear to him as children are
To brooding, mother heart."

So spake the modern preacher.
And I who take to gentle truth and mild

Had almost said, '*Amen!"
It seemed to me so comforting,

70

And then —
I looked around and saw the woe

All caused by human sin,
The everlasting Calvary,

Beneath the world's wild din;
And thought if I by word or deed

Had helped to press hard down
Upon the brow of Son of Man,

The heavy, thorn-made crown.
Although my feet tread golden streets,

Where heavenly anthems swell.
Within the halls of memory

Is everlasting hell.
And if sin be an opiate

And make me cease to care.
And lose the tender heart that sobs

The penitential prayer.
Ah, well!

That would be, it seems to me,
The very lowest hell!

71

TOMORROW

THE far tomorrow, cold and dim,
Will simply be to go with Him
On through the evening's peaceful gloam,
On to the Father's ** Welcome Home."

72

HIS DEITY

(John 17.)

"TT ry should I worship Jesus Christ,

V V The Galilean seer?"
I asked my friend the scientist,

Whose mission keeps him near
First causes.

**Because," he said, "Within your Book
It tells of how He reigned supreme

0*er forces of whose mastery
We scientists but dream
And wonder.'*

But just because He has the power,

And with it too the skill
To run this belted universe

As Dives runs his mill
For profit.

Does not move me to worship Him.

A democrat am I,
And bow my head as reverently

To him who passes by
To labor,

With overalls and jumper.

And dinner pail in hand,
Whose soul, unstained, erect.

Meets every demand
Of manhood.

73

**Why should I worship Jesus Christ,

The Galilean seer?"
I asked the white souled Christian,

Who lingered ever near
His presence.

* 'Because Infinite Holiness,

Wherever it is found.
Makes all before its burning bush

Tread softly holy ground
And pray."

"In God the Father, throned above.

In God's eternal Son,
Its uncreated glory shines.

That makes them ONE,
Forever."

*'And we who feel its power

Are moved to humbly pray
And, more than that, as thoughtful men,

Its inner call obey
And imitate."

*'That going up the shining way

On toward the central sun.
We, too, may then become a part

Of that eternal ONE,
Forever."

74

A TOAST

UNLESS I put within this book
Where wistful maidens glance,
A song of younglings making love,

The flavor of romance.
The reading public will declare,

* Though what he says is nice.
His soul is like November nights
With moonlight on the ice."

But when a youth has loved a lass

More dearly than his life,
And when it simply came to pass

That she became his wife.
And still across the snowy cloth

She smiles like heaven on him.
The memory of the courtship days

Becomes a little dim.

He cannot somehow set to verse

The thrill that came and went.
Because he has within his heart

A song of glad content.
I lift my cup and drink my toast

That brims v/ith joy and laughter,
Not for days before I wed.

But those that have come after.

75

A LOVE POEM

DID you ever see a couple,
Homely as some wrinkled fruit?
Did you wonder how that couple
Ever could each other suit?

Did you ask yourself the question
With a comprehension dim,
**How could he think she was lovely?"
**What could she behold in him?"

Could you follow that same couple
To the cottage by the way.
Where he tramps him home at sunset,
Where she waits at close of day.

Could you stand unseen between them,
And behold the inner light.
Flashed soul deep from each to other
Like a beacon in the night.

You would understand the secret.
Not that love is very blind.
But that love is not near-sighted
And can see beneath the rind.

76

"Her happy face made passing folks take one more
hungry look"

"WHERE IS YOUR HOME?*

SHE came to make a little visit
When she was three years old,
Her eyes were like the summer sea,
Her hair was fine spun gold.
Her lips were like the strawberries
Which grow beside the brook ;
Her happy face made passing folks
Take one more hungry look ;
Her merry prattle filled my home
Until there came the day
When she must close her little visit
And journey far away.

I said to her, **My little lass,

Will you go home today?"

She dimpled with a bashful smile,

**IVe got to go to play

Out in the yard with my new doll.

So I canH go, you know ;

Perhaps some other morning bright.

If you think best, PU go."

My jealous heart gave one glad leap,

I said within me, **Never!

If you don't want to journey home,

I'll keep you here forever."

77

But when I took her to the train

On which her father came,

And as he stood there by our side,

And called her by her name,

Her blue eyes misted o'er with tears,

And she could hardly speak.

She gave one leap to his strong arms

And nestled by his cheek.

To cover up my homesick heart

I said, ** Where are you going?'*

**I'm going home," she shouted back.

And then, as if not knowing,

* 'Where is your home?" I questioned her;

She patted with her baby hand

Her father's cheek with gentle grace,

**Why home is where my papa is,"

She said and hid her face.

O fairy teacher, by your lips
Eternal truth is given.
Philosophy of happy homes,
Geography of Heaven!

78

"WE WILL WALK THE GOLDEN
STREETS TOGETHER*'

Dedicated to my Mother

WE will walk the golden streets together,
We will climb the beauteous hills,
We will linger by the fountains
And the gentle flowing rills.
We will listen to the angel song
And to their harps of gold.
Oh, the glory and the rapture !
It can never here be told.

We will journey through the city
And the suburbs far and near.
In the land that has no sorrow.
In the land that has no fear.
We will gather fadeless flowers
From the fields of lasting green.
Oh, the glory and the rapture!
It can never here be seen.

But amid the joy and gladness
Of the blest "forevermore,'*
While the sea that shines like crystal
Tosses spray upon the shore.
And the angels in their reverence
Hush their harps and still their song.
We shall see in all His glory
The Christ we^ve loved so long.

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TO MY CRITIC

YOU need not tell me, critic dear,
Because you see I know it,
I have too much preacher blood
To be your kind of poet!
And to the truth you mention now
I fear I shall not 'wake,
That when one sings of common things,
Then **art for art's own sake"
Should be his guiding principle.
And he should be content
To please the eye and please the ear.
For thus were poets meant.

You see I cannot quite forget
That when this wondrous world
Was by Our Father's skillful hand
Through starlit spaces whirled.
He meant that by the things we see,
If we but think and heed.
Life's deeper secrets hidden there,
Our hearts should learn to read.
That life itself is one great poem
Whose meaning we may find,
If we approach its mystery
With reverent heart and mind.

80

"THE END IS NOT YET"

'^rOT yet the end, while human hate
■^ ^ Still mocks the angel song of old,
Although the hour in time is late,

And signs by hoary seers foretold
Long since have passed, like striking bells

That mark the hours of star-watched night,
Until with joy the morning swells

And eastern skies all flame with light.

Not yet the end, while human greed

Still seeks with lustful eyes the soil
Where patient peasants sowed the seed,

And sanctified it with their toil.
And gold is god and fame the crown

That men pursue with quenchless thirst,
And swiftly strike a brother down

Lest he should gain its glitter first.

8i

Not yet the end, while human blood

Bespatters marketplace and mead,
And like a mighty, rushing flood,

The hellish hounds of war are freed,
Until the sun turns dark with shame,

The silver moon flames fiery red.
While weltering nations count their fame

From heaps on heaps of foemen dead.

Not yet the end, until the Child

Who came to earth while beamed the star,
Shall wield His scepter, meek and mild,

And men shall see the things as they are.
O heart of mine, be patient yet,

The road winds on for many a mile,
'Though men grow heedless and forget

They'll think and weep, in afterwhile.

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The dear home paths

WHEN WE ALL GET HOME AT
NIGHT

WHEN in other lands we wander,
And in distant paths we roam,
How our hearts grow warm and tender,
When at night we think of home.

And the hills we loved in childhood
Seem to call us from afar.
As they did when o*er their summits
We beheld the evening star.

Our lives are but a journey
'Round the circle, through the glen,
And when shadows fall at even
We shall all come home again.

In the dear home paths we'll wander.
And the years that took their flight
In our joy will be forgotten,
When we all come home at night.

And the Father who has missed us,
When so sadly we did roam,
And the Saviour who has loved us
Will receive us, ** Welcome home."

83